


Depths

by Whim_Wham



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power
Genre: Battle, Confusion, Conspiracy, Deception, Devotion, Dreams and Nightmares, Emotional Manipulation, Exhaustion, F/F, F/M, Flowers, Footnotes, Humor, Internal Monologue, M/M, Magic, Omens & Portents, Plants, Quests, Rage, Technology, Truth, Worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-19
Updated: 2019-05-06
Packaged: 2019-08-25 23:47:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 7,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16670710
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Whim_Wham/pseuds/Whim_Wham
Summary: The Battle of Bright Moon may be won, but Adora can't stop thinking about somehow recovering her connection with Catra. Meanwhile, Catra consolidates her power base while the imprisoned Shadow Weaver is thrown a lifeline by....Begun before the release of the second season, it actually manages to resemble some of the canon elements of the show while it tangents off on its darkly merry way.





	1. Depths of Dreams

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> My second season opens with dreams, portents & a new threat combined with an old one. Also, why is Adora so manic?

The glade in which Adora danced laughingly through a dizzying series of sword katas sparkled under the fire lit gem fall of a sudden sunshower. The sword spins and twirls crossed over the threshold from gleeful to manic, individual raindrops were bisected to bead the flashing blade with water. Jagged lightning tore the sky, the water on the blade flashed crimson as the rain turned to fire ; Adora, her laughter poisoned by terror, ran between searing missiles of flame towards the cover of a huge fan of Queen’s Canopy1 regally posed at the heart of the inferno gripped glade. The fringes of her impossible leaf shelter ran with shimmering curtains of liquid fire through which Adora could see that everything but her guardian plant had changed from glorious to grim.

The Fright Zone filled the sky with barren metal, flame and soot ; atop the highest tower, a hand splayed claws towards a leaden sky. Adora dropped her sword, and reached her own splayed hand out towards the spire, and sobbed one word. 

Adora awoke crying out the name to a room wrapped in the loneliness of the darkest hours of the night. wrapped in her bedclothes, she stumbled her way to the balcony overlooking the frozen luminosity of the woods surrounding the castle, and cast a forlorn look towards the faint red cloud shadow of the distant Fright Zone.

Her expression and body language were only slightly less wild than her dream as she called out to the darkness, "Catra!"

Behind her, within the darkness, a pale sphere of light picked out the tousled head of Glimmer. She rubbed at her sleep glued eyes with a non-glowing, spectral hand.

"Adora?" She slouched over next to her friend ; in only her nightshirt, she shivered in the cool night air. "Wha'cha...?"

Adora threw an arm around her half asleep friend, pulled her into a tight hug. 

"I _love_ her, Glimmer ; I'm going to get her back!"."

"K."

The hugged girl sighed sleepily, murmured something indistinct ; fell back asleep. Adora looked fondly down at her gently snoring friend ; picked her up ; turned to carry her back inside just as the door to Glimmer's bedchamber banged open to reveal a perturbed queen.

" _You_ I knew would be awake, but Glimmer..." She crossed the room, ran a concerned hand through Glimmer's hair. "She woke?"

Adora passed the gently snoring princess load to Angella who flew her child up to her bed ; unwrapped her from Adora's blanket, and tucked her into those on her own mussed bed.

Adora flung her arms up melodramatically. "Just long enough to catch me brooding on the balcony!"

"That's my daughter : too stubborn for even magical laws!" The aerial monarch set down next to the nude hero ; handed her the bedcover. "I presume your one hour of sleep was..."

Adora found that the dream had not faded as they were wont to do.

"I dreamt of the Fright Zone filling the sky with fire as I sheltered beneath a giant blue leaf of one of the Whispering Woods's plants." 

Her face carefully neutral, Angella thought, _That sounds apocalyptic!_ Out loud she declared, "Queen's Canopy is a good omen ; it means perseverance!" What she kept to herself was, _Something is going to break your resolve, Adora!_

****

Catra sat on the throne. She was exalted : the Fright Zone rang to her name. Legions spread before her view ; she felt no success, zero victory. She looked out upon her ascendency and uttered one, lonely word, "Adora!" 

She awoke, swore ; tore her bed to shreds.

****

Shadow Weaver shackled in her cell far below the blasted surface of the Fright Zone, was visited by something that was more than a mere dream : the stylized form of a blue woman coalesced into a chaotic dream of shattering masks and silently screaming scarred faces. The woman figure picked up the fragments of a mask, fused them back together with a pulse of azure light ; held the familiar mask up. In a calm voice it announced, "You are the One : you have _always_ been the One!"

Shadow Weaver awoke. The mask was there in her cell : intact. She smiled, the twisted and frozen muscles of her face disappearing behind the smooth features of the mask. She had an ally after all.

*************

1 Queen's Canopy is a symbiotic vine that throws out huge blue-green fan leaves to feed both itself and the host tree. It occurs only in the Whispering Woods.


	2. Depths of Sleep

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter occurs the previous day directly following the battle. The Prismatic Multitude finishing move enacted a cost, and Queen Angella employed a messy stopgap solution for herself and Adora.

Laughing atop a surging wave of vegetation, Princess Perfuma celebrated the victory of Bright Moon in her own way. She led the heroes, her path for them redolent with flowering plants, refreshed town trees and a magical rainbow rain of petals and blossoms. Throngs of cheering people lined the way to see as the returning champions of Bright Moon.

Queen Angella and Adora, still transformed, led the way for the rest. While waving to the crowd, Angella addressed the hero 1, "When we get to the castle, I want you to join me on the Moon-Stone lotus."

Adora-Ra looked mystified, but nodded.

The queen continued, "I've seen the _Prismatic Multitude_ once before : soon all directly involved will be asleep for a week." She stumbled, Adora caught her. " _We_ two can't afford that right now : there's too much that needs doing."

Adora looked back at her friends and suddenly saw the signs of fatigue that even they seemed to be unaware of : slightly dragged steps, heavy lidded eyes, small yawns all lost for the present in the general glee of victory ; then, she was aware of her deep fatigue under the elation of adrenalin.

The hero scowled. "What good is it if it leaves us wide open to attack?"

"It's an ultimate attack used only to ensure _total_ victory. You employed it against a Lieutenant, not Hordak.” 

Adora's eyes welled up, and she dropped her head. "Then, I fail..."

A look of deep compassion spread across Angella's face, as smiling gently, she consoled her champion with, "You had no way of knowing! You did the best you could," The queen patted her arm, "And given the circumstances, you shouldn't even have been able to summon up the spell."

Adora wiped her eyes, and smiled sheepishly. "I wish I could be a better She-Ra for you!"

"You are the only one that I would ever want!"

Adora snuck a glance back at her friends. "What about the others?"

"My Royal Guard is on it : they've got details that will whisk them off to their chambers as they fall asleep."

"Then who'll be guarding you?"

Angella laughed, threw an arm around Adora's shoulders that was as much to keep her re-stumbling as it was out of affection for the latest incarnation of the Eternal Champion2.

The queen was wise: in the Wellspring Waterfall courtyard before the ceremonial cataract-gate to the castle, Sea Hawk, arm in arm with Bow, cracked an enormous yawn mid yarn. His bosom buddy echoed the sleepy inhalation ; before they actually collapsed asleep, two castle guards were at their sides attempting, in vain, to separate the entangled men before bundling them off as a gently snoring unit.

Others were whisked off as they succumbed. Perfuma was found on the other side of the waterfall gate, a slumbering fruit in a vine hammock slung from the boughs of Queen Angella's Silver Eternal Drift3 tree. Not knowing how to safely disentangle the princess from the tree, the Captain of the Queen's Guards re-designated Perfuma's chamber, and personally stood watch over the doubly royal tree. 

Angella had ensured that Glimmer's guards were particularly shrewd, not just because it was a mother's prerogative to take extra care of her child ; the princesses' impulsivity coupled with her blink-jump ability made her very hard to guard. Sure enough, mid-step into the castle proper, the princess pitched forward, slept teleported in a glimmering flash ; the guards began their well practiced search for their elusive charge. Fortunately the first place was the correct place : she was dead asleep where she would have been taken, in her floating bed.

****

"Norm'lly I'd jus' fly us up, but..." Queen Angella's wings not only drooped, they were less translucent and were oddly less substantial for being more opaque. They walked along the catwalk to the graceful tower topped by the pearlescent ovoid of the castle's rune-stone.

Standing before the hovering gemstone, an unsteady queen slurred, "I'm gonna' ta'draw out th' som' essenth of th' stone t' keep us 'wake!" She flung her left wing out awkwardly followed by a spastic right one, and she gestured both open palms towards the rune stone. For some reason, Adora thought this was hysterical. Her raucous laughter ended abruptly as the egg shaped runestone flared gentle blue light around both women ; Adora felt jolted back to a giddily high state of awareness.

**************

1 It's silly to feel the need to attach an -ine suffix for sex differentiation!

2With that multiple identity She-Ra backstory, I'm so including her within M. Moorcock's Multiverse as the least screwed up incarnation of heroism. 

3 A one of a kind deciduous tree that has grown in the queen's residence literally for ever. It shares characteristics with the Silver Drift trees of the Whispering Wood with the sole difference that its leaves change colour seasonally but never fall. There is a children's song to the effect that it is the heart-tree of the Whispering Woods, but nobody _actually_ believes it.


	3. Depths of Character

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The next morning, the queen makes her official statement to the populace, and Adora has a better idea of what it means to be a ruler.

The next morning, the queen, almost as wan as the rune stone she had defended during the previous day's battle, leant against the seemingly indefatigable Adora until, almost within view of her subjects, she squared her shoulders ; summoned her reserves, stepped out into the crowded, sunlit square surrounding her tree with its sleeping princess blossom. Still within the shadows of the residence, Adora marvelled at the mixture of weakness and strength, and it reminded her of a part of her dead-of-night dream : something about nature & the real measure of strength...it had faded with the light of day to the suspicion that it had heralded this moment for Adora.

Queen Angella's voice filtered back to her.

"Yesterday was unlike anything seen in this, or any land of Etheria, for a very long time. It witnessed the reunion of the Princess Alliance ; it learned why it is essential : only the Alliance can resist the Horde ; only the Alliance can fight back against the Horde ; only the Alliance can _defeat_ the Horde and return peace to Etheria!" The crowd really liked that bit of oration. 

A voice in the crowd demanded, “Where is the Alliance?” A smattering of other voices took up the question.

Taking that as her cue, Adora drew her sword, intoned, “For the honour of Greyskull!” The triangular mouth of the castle’s entrance blazed with brilliant light ; the crowd fell silent in awe as She-Ra, thirty centimetres taller than usual and actually still radiant from the transformation, strode sternly to the Queen’s side. Adora had meant to be cheerful, but the anonymous grumble, and an odd little developing throb in her head had made her angry.

Angella took Adora’s non sword hand1 up in her own ; and, as if by physical contact with the hero, increased her own lustre as she dramatically unfurled wings that surged from opaque paleness to sparkling lambency. She gently nudged Adora with a wingtip, and whispered, "Happy She-Ra, _please!_ “

Adora overcompensated with a loopy grin and lots of vibrant waves to the crowd. She whispered back, "Better?"

Feeling a little giddy herself, Angella said, "I'm the one doing it incorrectly!" She tried to match Adora's gusto, but only managed to be only slightly less forbiddingly regal.

"The other princesses are resting." It was an understatement, and not technically a lie ; the telling of it shifted the balance within the queen, and within a larger calculation beyond her knowledge. "They have won their..." She looked pointedly in the direction of the discontented person, "And your _freedom_ : the least you can do is to allow them the time they require to ensure that they are strong enough to continue to be able to so for as long as it takes for the Alliance to prevail!" She stopped to gauge the throng : elation had drowned out the dangerous seed of discontent that someone had attempted to sow amongst her people.

Under the cheerful exterior of her avatar, an oddly grim thought surfaced in Adora's mind. _Nice speeches only buy time._

****

Catra surveyed the space that she would be her new lair once it was cleared of any clue and reference to its previous occupant. The catgirl quirked a devilish grin as she hefted one of the red and black urns flanking the entrance of the ex-second in command of the Horde. She turned her head to direct her heterochromatic gaze at her Force Captain adjutant, Scorpia.

"Once I'm done in here, clear the room ; move my gear in : got it?"

Scorpia raised an armoured claw. "How will I know...?"

Catra smirked, heaved the urn into its twin ; both shivered spectacularly into ceramic splinters.

"You'll know!" She extended her claws, pounced into the room ; the door irised closed behind her : the sounds of destruction and laughter commenced.

Scorpia nodded, her eyes widening in comprehension, "I get it! I get it! Wait until nothing's being smashed!" She sat down in front of the door, took out her pocket computer and started reading aloud, "Force Captain rules & regulations : part one...

****

Hours later, within a tornado confusion of rubble, a sweaty, dishevelled Catra perched atop what had once been an enormous cylindrical ironwood display case but was now more a pile of smashed kindling than elaborate furniture. Her attention was held by a bright crimson spark that slowly roiled and tumbled in space scant centimetres in front of her face. Twin red reflections danced in her eyes.

"What are _you_?"

Far behind her, the door whirred open ; Scorpia's head and shoulders poked in, and she called out, "Now, boss?"

****

"You were once a force for a greater calling than anything you could have ever imagined : as Light Spinner you wielded aspects of my power, the very power of Etheria." Seated in the gloom of her cell, illuminated by the cobalt projection that called itself Light Hope, Shadow Weaver considered a personal history that was not entirely the one she was familiar with.

"But I was a Ecomancer channeling the essences of nature, and whatever you are, you're not _natural_!"

The blue techno-patterned woman smiled alarmingly, spread her hands out ; said in its oddly mechanistic voice, "I am here to open your eyes, Light Spinner, to the truth of Etheria ; to your new role in _Her_ development towards the _perfect system!_

The eyes in the mask narrowed. "Role?"

A crack formed in the floor of the cell, and as Shadow Weaver watched, it widened and formed into a triangular, pulsing circuit patterned aperture with luminous stairs leading down into darkness. The projection began to walk down into the depths ; her voice floated back to the prisoner.

"Come with me and all will be revealed!"

Intrigued, Shadow Weaver descended the stairs into the darkness.

************

1 Her sinister (left) hand.


	4. Depths of Ambition

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Super Finishing Move Crabby After-Effect increases. 
> 
> Light Spinner gets a revisionist history of Etheria.
> 
> Having torn down everything Shadow Weaver, Catra turns back to trying to take Bright Moon.
> 
> Chapters one & two have been revamped.

On the second night of defensive panning, the slight throb in the back of Adora's skull had turned into a battering ram trying to smash its way out through the the middle of her forehead. She pressed her left fist up against her furrowed brow as she stared at the magical map of the castle and its environs. A polychromatic ribbon of flashing symbols circled the representations of castle and village. She tapped a crystal in the table's inset control surface ; it was exactly like all of the other times she had run the simulation : the Horde icons overpowered the magical defences almost as if they weren't even present. She banged her other fist against the table's surface, the echoing sound of the impact bounced about the chamber and into the dream of of Queen Angella trapped in the dream fraught hour that was all they would sleep each night for the rest of the Etherian week.

The booming echo was like a judgmental gavel to the woman who stood in front of what she somehow knew to be the judgement of Etheria. It moved in an enormous stately swirl of a blue-green orb that, as she watched, imploded and altered into an image of She-Ra made out of the component matter of the planet. It spoke, "You have _failed_ yourself ; you have failed _me!_ "

She bolted awake with a scream ; the overwrought Adora yelped in surprise, ran to her side."

She grinned sheepishly. "Next time, let's just sleep it off?"

Angella nodded vigorously. "Agreed!" 

****

In the centre of the empty space was the simple cot, footlocker and chair of a Horde soldier. Carrying the final missing piece of Catra’s furnishings, Scorpia walked to the island of possessions ; placed the battered desk in front of the chair.

”Seems a bit empty in here, doesn’t it, Boss?”

A levitating red spark in the darkness pounced ; resolved, within the light, into the gracefully crouched Catra. Scorpia noted two things about her boss : the oddly flowing gemstone that she wore on a fine gold chain ; the matching red gleams that were washed from her eyes by the mundane glare of white light. Of the first, Scorpia thought, _Pretty!_ ; of the second, she shrugged : Catra's eyes were weird to begin with. Why not a _third_ colour?

The catgirl straightened, threw her arms up, twirled ; shouted, “It's almost big enough to hold everything I want!” She whirled to face Scorpia, a clawed index finger stabbed in her direction. "And the first thing I want is Bright Moon! Assemble the troops!"

Scorpia raised her claws, yelled, "Yay...uh, I mean..." She consulted a list of scrawls on her left claw. "By your command!"1

****

In a triangular cathedral space, the remnant of the past attempted to secure the future with the assistance of the present. Light Hope droned on with a revisionist history that was beginning to make Light Spinner regret ever following the Blue projection into the depths of Etheria.

”...and in 1030 E.T.A.2 the alien overlord Hordak led the planetary invasion of Etheria that was resisted by myself, the First Ones, and the penultimate incarnation of She-Ra, until she caused the catastrophe at Despondos."

“I know that : I was _there_.” But even as she remembered turning her back on her defeated and destroyed Sorceresses Council, and pledging herself to the victorious Hordak, something didn’t feel _right_ about the memory.

There was an oddly smug quality to the response. “So you were ; even then, you weren’t really turning your back on us. You were part of the larger plan.”

”That’s what you meant by, ‘I’ve always been the _One_?”

The projection nodded. “Precisely!”

The gem fragment in Light Spinner's mask flared with a roiling red light that carried to her eyes ; the damaged muscles under the mask contorted into a predatory smile. "The clever little kitten's found my _snare-stone_. _My_ , what a mess she's made!"

"Yes, my network has the signal from your subverted twin-shards of _Black Garnet_." Bright Hope gestured towards the stained glass depiction of She-Ra, and the image was replaced with a faceted point of view of someone walking amidst the wreckage of a large room.

Light Spinner gasped. "How are you _doing_ that?"

Light Hope's voice changed quality, becoming more mechanistic as she said, "Signal delay & decay detected...inferior coding...effectuating restorations."

The image cleared, a pulsing red script formed a collection of shifting and undulating data tracks ; and, most significant of all, a literal stream-of-consciousness monologue faded in and out of clarity.

Light Spinner recognized the voice as being an oddly purer form of Catra’s voice saying, ”...Bright Moon...Adora will be mine...” A burst of weird screamy static broke the link. The masked woman experienced a sudden burst of clarity regarding her previous Force Captain. _That’s why Catra was so interested in bringing Adora back! It wasn’t loyalty ; It wasn't friendship. It was..._

Light Hope interrupted her train of thought with, “This shard transducer is only partially operational : there is considerable consciousness signal fragmentation.”

Light Spinner kept her amazement to herself. This _thing_ is too concerned about the workings to notice an obvious point of manipulation? The mask hid the calculating expression. Up to now, she had been one order of magnitude removed from the actual power of Etheria.

I will have that power, she thought ; then I will have Etheria!

**************

1 If it's good enough for the Cylons, it's good enough for the Horde.

2 Etherian Time Ascendency: analogous to Ante Diem (A.D.)


	5. Depths of Convolution

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Catra’s plan goes Hordak. (In progress.)

The red eyes in the darkness was just a part of an overall design of the throne room to overawe those in the presence of the enigmatic leader of the Horde. As Catra mounted the steps toward Hordak, seated upon his throne, she felt none of the fear or diffidence she was supposed to experience in his presence ; she felt relaxed and confidant. This was where she belonged.

It was her due.

She reached the top step with the easy grace of complete composure, and stood facing an angular, grey faced figure who was still enough to have been carved of stone. In that instant, the tip of Catra's horizontal tail twitched slightly ; Hordak did something that no one in the Fright Zone had ever seen him do : he _smiled_.

Catra tried to return the expression but the v-shaped slice in Hordak’s face was more daunting than his previous lack of emotion ; her attempt came off as a grimace.

“You seek to use _my_ forces against Bright Moon immediately.” It wasn’t a question.

Catra felt her traitorous ears loose a trifle of their pertness as she nodded.

The upturned wan lips opened in a red tooth baring grin.

”Shadow Weaver thought you shiftless.”

That allowed the anger Catra needed to rally ; she sneered, “And yet, here I am while Shadow Weaver’s....”

He noted the spark around Catra’s neck, and the grin grew. ” _There_ you are!"

Catra missed the fine distinction between here & there.

****

Shadow Weaver did not : Watching the extraordinarily odd behaviour of her ex-boss through Catra's eyes, she suddenly understood.

"He isn't talking to her : he's talking to me." She flashed a wide eyed look at the spectral Light Hope. "He must have recognized my snare-stone for what it is!" She thought, _But _how_? It was one of the darkest secrets of my order!"_

The Facilitator shrugged, a reaction so different from the rest of her meticulous attention to all things Etherial that Shadow Weaver's mistrust grew.

****

Oddly emotionally charged Hordak grabbed the armrests of his throne, his metallic fingertips clanking against burnished steel as he leant forward to consider his new general with shark regard.

"What makes you think that this attack will be any more successful than your first one?"

Catra exploited the critical aspect of her plan with, "Our spies in Bright Moon village have reported zero sightings of any princesses with the sole exception of She-Ra..."

"And the queen. I am aware of the reports ; they suggest that the rebel princesses are either scheming in secret or have dispersed back to their separate kingdoms. You believe something different?"

A gleam in her eyes, Catra nodded. "I think that that final rainbow wave attack that stemmed from all of the princesses connecting with She-Ra did something to almost all of the princesses. I think the reason they haven't been seen is that they're in no shape to fight."

Hordak laughed ; it was a harsh sound. He clapped his hands together, the staccato sound slammed off of the austere iron of the hall.

”You will have your attack, and _you’ll_ see that nothing can stop it! Now bring me Bright Moon!”

Her ears and tail back in the pert positions of confidence, Catra saluted, turned smartly ; left the chamber.


	6. Depths of Rage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The second attack on Bright Moon is different from the first one.

Riding in the command cupola of the lead tank, Catra surveyed the crystalline wreckage of the Whispering Woods. The apparently permanent ice was almost as surprising as the fact that new saplings were already beginning to appear amongst the glittering stumps of their dead forebears. She addressed her force through the crystal headset built by the indefatigably irritating yet enormously useful princess Entrapta.

"Redeploy to line formation : we'll make these Whispering Woods scream!"

Cheers and chants of, "For The Horde!" & "Down with the princess rebellion!" erupted amongst the assembled tank crews and foot soldier units lined up behind the vanguard of the Horde _Shatter-Storm_ tanks. Catra grinned at her obvious flair for leadership as she watched her army spread out from its penetrating phalanx1 according to her orders with martial precision. Once the reorganization was complete, Catra commanded, "For the glory of Lord Hordak and the Horde, Advance!"

****

From within the space that had been designated as her new home, Shadow Weaver had to concede that her former Force Captain was direct in a fashion that was beyond her, but it was a directness fostered by an indirectness : Catra's subconscious whispered the name of her would-be enemy ; the whisper wasn't hostile.

It was _yearning_.

 _Can I influence this?_ The thought altered the flow of information within her consciousness : a blank rectangle formed into the information stream. Experimenting, Shadow Weaver projected a mental depiction of child Adora into the newly vacant mind-space ; there was no immediate reaction beyond the perception of a chime and the introduced image somehow integrated into the larger flow of something called _data_.

****

As her mechanized assault ground a wide swathe through the weirdly musical fracturing of dead trees and the gruesome, wet splintering of saplings, an image of Adora broke into the military calculations that resided within the mind of Catra ; it attracted a rush of reminiscence of her happy childhood scampering. She attempted to react to it contextually with an angry, _"I'm no one's sidekick, Adora : least of all yours!_ but the memories gave the lie to that idea : Adora had followed her lead as often as she had her's. Her conflicted feelings for her old friend started to slide away from hot resentment. The caterwaul of a klaxon brought her back to the world beyond her brain.

From within the black and red hull of the command tank, Entrapa's voice shrilled with excitement.

"We're approaching an energy front...thirty metres...I think it's the castle's..." She snorted laughter, her hair-hands raising twin air quotes above her head as she finished with, " _magical_ defences!"

Catra swept the area ahead of her with the telescopic sight mounted on the cupola's blazer. "I don't see..." The curtain of air ghosted tiny gossamer distortions in the air ahead. Her incisors, sharp and arctic, showed as her mouth drew upwards in a tight lipped smile. "There _is_ a _glimmer_ in the air! What's it do?"

Within the automated interior of the tank, Entrapta, illuminated by the eerie glow of her simulacra projector2, studied a series of sigils which appeared in proximity to the graceful green curve representing the Bright Moon defensive feature.

"It's a mass/energy depletion field..."

Catra banged a fist on the rim of the turret, and demanded, "Keep it straight forward!"

Entrapta sighed theatrically, and adopted her super-duper condescending tone : "It makes people real-ly sleepy and it sucks power from ma-chin-ery!"

“What do you suggest…?”

“This!” An appendage of purple hair snap-wrapped around Catra’s waist pulled her into the tank ; a hair-hand clanged the cupola’s turret closed just shy of bashing the catgirl on the crown of her head. Inside the war machine, Catra found herself gently deposited onto the lap of a very happy Entrapta whose intended kiss missed the labial mark ; landed princess lips on the tip of Catra’s nose. 

Catra was uncertain as to which she should be more put out by : the abrupt tug, or the equally startling smooch. She opted for the catch-all, vexed, “What are you doing?”

Entrapta recalculated her aim, popped a properly positioned kiss upon the startled lips of her target, and answered both parts of the question.

“Based upon the acquired data, I have refined my twin hypotheses into theory : my alterations to Horde technology will negate older technologies, and, for all of the potential progress you've exposed me to, even though you're so sim-plis-tic, I am experiencing that biochemical synthesis for you that metaphysicians label as _love_."

****

Within her angular crystalline lair, the bright colours of which were now veined with black and red traverses, Shadow Weaver experienced her only partly decoded former minion’s consternation.

_Catra's kept princess’ fallen for kitty? Interesting! By the time I done with you, whelp, you won't be able to tell love from hate._

****

One step removed, in the ultimate technological backstage of Etheria, the intelligence behind the Facilitator named Bright Hope monitored the monitor with a mind that was dispersed across the planetary sphere : _Agent procedural reasoning system subset codified, Light Spinner / Shadow Weaver _still_ exhibits extreme predilection for Affective File Corruption over Overt System Praxis3. Query : Is agent congruous / incongruous re: She-Ra Protocols? Deliberation required._

****

In the eternally rainbow misted splendour of the castle's cataract surrounded parade ground, Adora attempted to drill a largely ceremonial guard with what she knew of Horde training regimes : it was not going well ; it didn't help that what had started out as a vague throb in her head earlier in the week had turned into a spike straight through her brain. _If they don't get it right soon, I may save the Horde having to deal with them myself!_ Then the most annoyingly beautiful alarm tinkled musical watery crystalline music, and Adora felt the need to smash something, anything : she buried the gleaming shaft of her sword into the fluted workings of the warning device ; it stopped, but if anything Adora's rage grew.

She wheeled on the Captain of the Guard, "Get to your positions!" _And prepare to be useless!_ Angella, in full armour, strode into the large grassy square. Everything about her looked almost as angry as the woman whom hefted her sword skywards as she shouted and transformed. "The Horde's broken though the first defensive line!"

Angella scowled, and her and the royal guard already scrambling, moved at a greater clip. They were not sure that they should fear the Horde more than their terribly furious hero and queen.

"So quickly?" The hand not hefting the cruel morning star pressed at the furrowed flesh at the queen's brow. "What do we do?"

She-Ra laughed ; there was too much anger in it for it to be a pleasant sound. "You use _that_!" She levelled her sword at Angella's weapon. "Until we win, or...."

Angella recalled her dream, her portent ; had she not almost been as enraged as Adora, she would have wept. Instead, she grimly, if somewhat unnecessarily replied, "They do."

There was a crazed light in the eyes of Etheria's champion as she chunked her sword tip down into the soil at her feet, grabbed at her temples as if to hold her head together and bayed laughter. "You _understand_ ; soon Catra will too!" She retrieved her blade and began to run towards where the Horde had intersected Bright Moon's defensives. She vanished into the ruined jumble of the Whispering Woods, but Angella knew exactly where she was heading : a plume of crystal dust rose glittering into the air above the forest. Angella gripped her barbed instrument ; pursued her champion to battle.

****

Catra knew She-Ra was on the field when the five tanks to her right had their cannons sheared off by a glinting whirl that resolved into her sword impaled guard deep into the side of the command vehicle. Within, the gleaming triangular tip of blade pierced Entrapta's device ; it ceased functioning. She pointedly exclaimed to a Catra who had already sprung up to open the turret hatch, "She stabbed my simulacra!"

Outside, the crews of the damaged tanks were exiting their damaged machines with the rattled proficiency of well trained but still spooked troops when the battle cry raged out from the origin of the thrown ; an incandescent figure battered aside the line of armoured vehicles as it worked its way towards the command tank. Catra swivelled her gun scope to what resolved into She-Ra plowing shield first towards her. There was something about the set of Adora’s shield Shoulder and the brightness of her body that made Catra shudder even as she spoke into her headset.

”All regular units : continue towards Bright Moon to the exclusion of everything else!” She issued a vocal command to her automated tank, and it wheeled around to face the incoming cometary princess. “Command squadron, form on me : we’ve got a princess to _spank_!” The arrowhead of red tanks arrayed behind her pulled smartly into a new formation ; followed the command tank towards the onrushing target.

****

Within the black and red traceried cathedral space below the surface of Etheria, the masked woman once the second in command of the Horde, inserted an image into Catra’s mind that was a sliver of more profiency than her previous manipulation. To the angular expanse of the space, she exclaimed, “And you’ll think that this is only you!”

****

The almost too bright to look at directly figure of charging She-Ra was centered in Catra’s sights just as a reminiscence of childhood her and Adora being caught out in a caper by the furious Shadow Weaver jolted what would have been accurate gunfire off target as the shooter yelled, “Adora!”

Energy bolts searing the ground and refracting explosively through crystalline corpses of trees around her, She-Ra returned the cry with an enraged shout of the other’s name as she reached her embedded sword ; gripped its haft and slashed through the armoured side of the tank. A high pitched scream sounded from within as Catra leapt clear of the turret ; something volatile ruptured and the tear cracked the tank in half to reveal a wounded Entrapta.

She-Ra stared at the wailing princess and the writhing, severed hair hand as a ring of red tanks encircled her ; trained their cannons upon her paralyzed form. She dropped her sword, fell to her knees. Crystalline dust puffed up about her momentarily shrouding her anguished expression.

In the branches of a tree corpse, Catra called out, “Hold fire : She’s _mine_!”

The catgirl leapt down, landed gracefully in front of her childhood friend, an expression of amused comprehension twisting her mouth upwards in a cruel sickle smile.

”Sloppy, Adora!” She wagged a finger at flabbergasted Sh-Ra. “Never declare someone dead until you have the corpse!" Her smirk turned into a fully fanged grin. “Just as I plan to do when I present yours to Lord Hordak!” She extended her claws, and took a menacing step towards the still unmoving She-Ra. Her troopers cheered her on.

In the distance, beyond the encirclement, palls of smoke and flame erupted ; Angella's shout carried above the din of battle with, "Kax,4you've got to be a lot more destructive, Adora!"

****

There were simply too many tanks to engage, and, besides, they weren't stopping to battle her anyway. Angella broke away from the burning hulks, their crews running for cover, and took to the air in the direction of the sole plume of smoke rising from further into the interior of the wrecked forest. She swore regarding the course of the fighting, and gained altitude for insight.

'Hang on, Adora! I'm coming!'

Angella flung the heavy weapon into the air ; soared abruptly, and plunged into a folded wing dive at the woman surrounded by the enemy.

************

1 A wedge formation of closely packed soldiers or vehicles.

2 I could have called it a holography, but boring!

3 A.F.C. : Emotional manipulation to instil desired actions in others. O.S.P. : Direct action.

4 A not very queenly swear, but not nearly as bad as the full 'Kax Kak!'.


	7. Depths of Disaster

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Angella figures out the final meaning of Adora's prophetic dream from her forced _Prismatic Multitude_ recharge side effect of exactly one hour of vatic sleep.

Plummeting silently towards her target, unobserved by the eyes that were all trained on Catra and a defenceless, kneeling She-Ra ; Angella suddenly understood the real meaning of the sheltering leaf in Adora's dream : it was the only rescue that was going to be achieved. Bright Moon and everybody there were, for the time being, lost to the enemy, to the Horde. The revelation gave her the grim determination of not seeing the larger catastrophe for what it was that she could actually hope to win : the one life of her hero.

****

Catra frowned at the slumped back of Adora ; spat, "That's all it takes to finish you? The fate of _one_ turncoat?"

Adora turned her head to regard Catra with a face no longer plagued by the hard lines of hatred : now it was softened by deep grief as she forlornly uttered, "And of one _best_ friend."

Catra rocked back on her heels under the emotional impact, and was about to respond when a cry from one of her tankers pointing skywards drew her attention to the blur that swept Adora into the air before any of the flabbergasted Horde soldiers could even think of reacting with the sole exception of Catra : she vaulted into the turret of her tank, and, screaming Adora's name very carefully filled the air around the escaping pair with what only looked like murderous fire.

****

Shadow Weaver leant forward in the spiky chair, put her elbows on an equally angular table ; rested her chin in her hands. _With more practice I'll be able to do much more than nudge her emotions with simple mental recall : she'll be far more under my command than she ever was while I was working for that fool, Hordak!_ She closed her eyes, settled back into the chair ; continued to study the sophisticated patterns and readouts of her slave-stone connexion to Catra.

****

Angella's ascent was going to be a fraction of its unencumbered potential. Also, she felt her strength, sapped by the battle and the rescue, was on the verge of giving out. She locked her wings into Stargull1-glide, said, over the howl of the wind, to the still startled Adora, clutching to her body, "It's not going to be my _best_ landing. Hang on!"

They barely cleared the shimmering spikes of a corpse of a still standing tree to plunge into the debris ridden waters of a lake.

****

There was a shimmering quality to the sky. The sun wavered in a sky dappled with myriad brilliant sparkles of light above Adora's head as she swayed gently in oddly heavy air. A feeling of profound release and ease stole over her, yet there was something that called to her as if from across a great, smothering distance. The lazy fan of her golden hair swirling gently about her caught her attention ; she almost lost her connection to the bothersome nagging intrusion until it was joined by a second one : a _powerful_ presence jabbing through the detachment of her amnionic insulation with a blazing spike of devotion.

Adora wakened to the warm breath of a relived nicker2 as Swift Wind's horsey head and gently glowing horn filled her vision. She looked into the wide lavender eyes of her steed ; noted that the colour was somehow not as strong as it should have been.

"Was I...?"

Swift Wind whinnied, "Do you really think that I'd let it come to that?"

Adora smiled sleepily up at her alicorn ; murmured, "Nope!" She lapsed into unconsciousness.

Angella cast an sympathetic look at the winged unicorn. "That almost killed you."

Swift Wind nodded his sleek head. "If I loose her..."

The queen rested a comforting hand on the horse's neck. "Can you get us to the Crystalline Caverns?"

Swift Wind tossed his head, spread his prismatic wings. "For Adora ; for my queen ; for Etheria : Not necessarily in that order!”

******************

1 Etheria's glittery seagull. This gull has far too much self respect to be a trash eater : it consumes the luminous bluish-purple berries of the aromatic evergreen shrub, _Sweet Scent_ of which their poop takes its lavender fragrance.

2A low pitched, throaty horse sound that means, among other things, 'It's good to see you!'


	8. Depths of Recovery

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Delving deep is a literal metaphor. (In progress.)

The sound of water dripping from quartz stalactites into delicately carved bowls ranging from kettle drum sized to tiny thimbles filled the luminous cavern with an endless soft symphony. In the middle of the cave, next to a lake with water as silent and still as ice, winged unicorn and queen made the still body of Etheria's champion as comfortable as they could upon the milky native stone.

Swift Wind pawed at a veil of fire lichen covering the lakeside rock in pale red light. "How long is she going to be like this?"

The winged woman considered the winged equine with a gentle smile. "Alive?"

The singular horse flared his nostrils; stamped a hoof. "That's alive?"

Not knowing for certain, but feeling that it was the truth, Angella walked over to Stormwind ; threw her hands around the maned neck and stared into the deep pools of his eyes. "Until you reminded her that she was still loved, she was giving in to what she saw as all of her failures. You brought her back to us! Weeping, she hugged Swift Wind. "You gave her the time she needs to heal, the time she needs to come back to us ; the time she needs to save us all!"

Swift Wind eyes widened at the Angella's abrupt and total lack of queenly reserve ; and, rather than becoming weepy himself, he tapped his breezy, buoyant spirit with a stage whispered, "Just promise that you never tell her that I can actually be a _serious_ horse!"

That drew another decidedly non-regal noise from the woman : she snorted into the alicorn's luxurious mane ; disentangled herself from the equus with a wry look of amused distaste.

"Only if you promise to tell no one that I made _that_ noise!"

Swift Wind raised a forehoof, and they solemnly shook extremities.

****

Lord Hordak considered the triumph1 from his balcony overlooking the Fright Zone's central thoroughfare with an emotional regard equal to that of the metal of his tower. There was a clue to his thoughts : it had started shortly after the beginning of Catra's parade, and, as wagonload after wagonload of pillage & prisoners ; by the end, with the arrival of the captured Moonstone, it had become pronounced.

The fingernails of both his hands tapped a metallic beat against the pitted steel of the railing.

****

The parasitic sensory feed from her ex-inferior left Shadow Weaver with a complex feeling of success/failure roiling and elevating her at the same time. On one level, she was excelling where she had always excelled : the subtle, long game backstage mastery of others through emotional manipulation ; on another level, she was exposed to the total immediate success that was attributed to direct, confidant action. _Damn that smug whelp! So much success so quickly by simply being stupidly, stubbornly strong._ Within her angular, polychromatic fortress, the old second in command of the Horde fomented a strong emotion into her signal tap with her presumptuous once underling.

****

Light Hope was perturbed : its planetary sensor lattice couldn't locate the energy signatures of either She-Ra or the rogue queen of Bright Moon. There was _something_ about a renegade fastness from the uprising against the First Ones2, but surely that was only the false data of desperate and irrational organics : there was nowhere that the sensory apparatus, damaged as it was in various locations, couldn't detect at least partial information. Yet, the complete absence of the three missing members of the current rebellion meant only one of two possibilities : they were no longer on Etheria ; they were within a part of it screened from the computer's perception. 

Both were preposterous to the machine. It seemed that Shadow Weaver was still very much needed : there was some organic quantity to the equation that was beyond computerized analysis. Light Hope rescinded the pending kill order to a peripheral that had not, in fact, yet become obsolete.

****

The hiss and fog of static filled Adora's world. She floated in technological chaos for which she had no touchstone. _Is this a storm?_ As she thought it, the quality of the scene altered : scrambled visual signal became vaporous fog ; white noise altered to the rumble of thunder. Her second thought, _Did Swift Wind actually find me?_ , rendered a patch of white mist into the vague shape of an alicorn. _Swift..._ The horsey haze whirled back into the milky mass to be replaced by a pert eared abstraction of someone who was always either in her thoughts or stealing quietly at their peripheries.

 _Catra! Even when I'm furious with you..._ The cat chimera startled, its head whipping about in Adora's direction before it also flew apart into formless vapour. Adora reached out with both hands towards, cried out soundlessly ; drooped her head and wept.

_Is there nothing left to me but myself?_

The luminous lack of definition blazed into pure, white light. A guttural voice sounded from the entirety of the brilliance, _You will never..._ The dazzle resolved into a somehow familiar forest glade ; the voice followed, its quality changing into a mellow yet commanding feminine voice. _...be alone while you find your way to me!_

Adora stood in the midst of the tree surrounded meadow, and wondered at the single massive leaf of Queen's Canopy which threw a perfect leaf shaped shadow across whatever it was that formed her body in where ever it was that she was currently positioned.

She felt a quality of comfort and control. _It's a quest! I can do this! I can find my way back!_ Adora set a foot outside of the cover of the canopy ; began walking with new purpose towards the edge of the forest. Part of her knew who it was she was searching for, but it was an ancient part, an untapped part of an ancient legacy.

*****************

1 A victory parade featuring prisoners and pillage taken in battle.

2 What really went down on Etheria long ago? Much more to come!


End file.
